Ising,
Ernest Horace (1884 - 1973)

Born at Norwood, South Australia on 1st July 1884, died Adelaide 15th May
1973.

On 15th May 1973 Mr. E. H. Ising guest botanist at the State Herbarium Adelaide,
passed away after a short illness at the age of 88. Mr. Ising was born at
Norwood on 1st July 1884: A paternal Great Grandfather was a watchmaker and
jeweller who came from Lubeck, a German port on the Baltic Sea. His paternal
Grandfather was born at Nairne in the Adelaide Hills. Ernest's early schooling
was undertaken at Thebarton Primary School. Later on his family moved to Upper
Sturt where his father bought a small property. They lived there only about
a year.

Because of indifferent health Mr. Ising went to live at Victor Harbor where
he worked at Bells Drapery Store. Later on, about 1905 or 1906, he was in
partnership with .James Wilton as a Photographic Dealer at Victor Harbor.
His early interests in natural history and photography were undoubtedly nurtured
in these early years when he took long walks and observations of flora and
fauna in the Victor Harbor district.

In the early years of the First World War he joined the South Australian
Railways where he worked for many years as clerk and paymaster. On 26th March
1913 he married Isabella Lockhart Quin, who bore him one son Geoffrey Ernest,.
b. 21.11.15 and three daughters, Isabel Christie, b. 2.2.18, Margaret Lucy,
b. 17.12.19 and Helen Christie, b. 30.8.24. After the War both Mr. Ising's
parents died soon after each other, and he was forced to battle hard in those
years of his life to provide for his family.

For almost twenty years between the end of the First World War and 1940 Mr.
Ising made priceless contributions to South Australian Botany. In 1915 he
took part on the Field Naturalists' Section long weekend excursion on October
8to Blinman, Ferguson Gorge, Moolooloo Station, Mount Patawurta and
Nuccaleena Mine, where he collected some of his very first herbarium specimens.
Other early plant collections were made near Henley Beach and Enfield an outer
Adelaide suburb: the collections from Enfield (Brook's Scrub) being especially
valuable for many shrub and perennial species have now been wiped out by settlement.
A series of important articles published in the Transactions of the Royal
Society in 1922 are the result of a trip he accomplished along the Transcontinental
railway line between Hughes and Kingoonya during September 5 - 24, 1920.

Because he was employed by the Railways, Mr. Ising was able to use his pass
to travel to remote outback areas of northern South Australia. A good deal
ofhis work therefore was accomplished in the Oodnadatta region and
near Pedirka. In 1933 he paid a visit to Horseshoe Bend, Alice Springs and
MacDonnell Station 240 kilometres north east of Alice Springs. The Monarto
South - Kinchina district attracted his attention in the middle 1920s. In
conjunction with Professor J. B.
Cleland and J. M. Black, a valuable
paper "The Plants of Kinchina and Monarto South" was published in the
South Australian Naturalist in 1926.

Other important work was accomplished by him in the Wudinna and Darke Peake
districts of Eyre Peninsula, at the River Finniss, near Penola and Lucindale
in the South East of the State and with Professor Cleland at Mount Remarkable,
Melrose.

Ernest Ising was elected a member of the Royal Society of South Australia
in May 1918: he served as a member of their Council from 1935 - 38 and was
elected Vice President in 1939 and 1940, but he severed his membership of
the Royal Society in 1940. In later years when he presented papers to the
Royal Society for publication, these were always read by an intermediary;
either Miss Constance Eardley
of the University of Adelaide Botany Department or Dr. Hansjoerg
Eichler, Keeper of the State Herbarium of South Australia.

Mr. Ising joined the Field Naturalists' Section of the Royal Society in 1915.
He was Secretary from 1918 - 1929, Vice Chairman in 1930, Chairman 1931 -33
and Treasurer 1934 - 40: a truly great devotion to that Club's activities.

The death of his son Geoffrey Ernest, a navigator in the Royal Air Force,
whose plane was shot down over Burma in 1943, was a heart felt blow. He resigned
from the Field Naturalists' Section and took solace in religion. He became
an ardent lay preacher in the Methodist Church in the Hills circuit around
Crafers and Stirling. It was his custom to visit the various churches as preacher
and organist; and was also a Sunday School Teacher at the Stirling Methodist
Church. For a number of years Mr. Ising paid scan t attention to his natural
history pursuits; indeed it was not until 1954 that Miss Eardley and a little
later Dr. Eichler, gradually encouraged him to renew his botanical investigations.

His youngest daughter Helen lived at Evelyn Downs from 1944 -55 where her
husband managed a sheep station. Her father used to visit there once a year
when he helped in the woolshed during shearing time and even learnt to bake
oven bread. The station which received mail from Oodnadatta only once a month
was very isolated, being 65 kilometres from the nearest neighbour. It was
usual for Mr. Ising to walk to distant parts of the station making arid plant
collections; but occasionally a vehicle would take him to places 60 to 80
kilometres away. A Goodenia species G. helenae discovered on
Evelyn Downs Station, he named after his daughter.

During the second period of Ising's botanical endeavour from 1955 -73 he
rendered outstanding work into studies of the Family Chenopodiaceae, in
particular the Genera Kochia, Bassia and Atriplex. Altogether,
Mr. Ising described *53 species or varieties of plants many of which were
new to science.

Mr. Ising lived at Stirling where his wife was proprietor of the popular
afternoon tea spot known as "Primrose Tea Gardens". With the rerouting of
the Hills Freeway in the 1960s the Isings moved to a spacious property with
a fine garden on the Crescent at Crafers. Failing eyesight curtailed his work
and though an operation somewhat improved the affliction, he published his
last contribution "Six New Species of Bassia All" in 1969.

The authors had the pleasure to know Mr. Ising at the Herbarium where he
worked in an honorary capacity as one of the Herbarium botanists. He was a
kindly old man, a real gentleman, who was ever willing to lend encouragement
to the young botanist and collector. If he knew a person was visiting any
remote place in the interior, he would always make a humble request that a
sharp lookout should be made for his beloved Chenopodiaceae.He was
fond of a joke and delighted in making little puns in his own unassuming manner.
Ernest Ising was one of the last of that generation of fine naturalists and
professional scientists including J. M. Black, Professor J. B. Cleland, H.
M. Cooper, Professor T. G. B. Osborne, S. A. White and H. M. Hale who served
the State of South Australia so admirably during the period 1920-70.

Dr. Eichler in an obituary notice published in the "Adelaide Advertiser"
stated that together with the late J. M. Black and Sir John B. Cleland he
ranked foremost in advancing the knowledge of our State flora. Perhaps too
in retrospect we should add that it was a pity he did not receive more recognition
in scientific circles. Ernest Ising devoted the best part of his life to the
study of botany; and it is most gratifying to learn that a grandson William
Morris studies Botany at the Melbourne University, and is carrying on the
family tradition. Mr. Ising was survived by three daughters, 13 grandchildren
and four great grandchildren. His wife predeceased him in 1972.